'WIDE MEADOWS': SURPRISES AFTER THE AUCTION (A CONTINUING SERIES)

Editor's note: This is an excerpt of a chapter from Jean Bell Mosley's book "Wide Meadows" that was first published in 1960.

In the meantime the bidding had resumed.

"Twenty!" the woman said, looking unruffled but resigned, as if she were prepared to go on to a hundred or more.

Granny made her way to the back of the crowd, her narrow little shoulders looking more humped than ever.

Twenty, once," the auctioneer warned. "Twenty, twice!"

Cabe suddenly pushed his way up through the crowd. The auctioneer thought he was a new bidder and gave him a little time to inspect the bed. Cabe unscrewed one of the lopsided, loose-fitting brass knobs, looked into it, gave a low whistle, shrugged his shoulders, hastily put the knob back on and walked off, wiping his hands on his overalls.

A knowing titter passed through the crowd. Slow grins spread over faces.

"Bugs," someone surmised audibly.

"Twenty, three times and --" the auctioneer appeared in a hurry to be done with it now.

"Twenty-one!" Lou shouted.

The auctioneer turned to the strange woman, motioning that it was her time to bid, but she, too, was disappearing toward the back of the crowd, shuddering.

"Twenty-one, once," the auctioneer now continued. Twenty-one, twice, three times, and sold to the little girl in the blue dress."

Lou walked up proudly to claim her prize. If bedbugs were the only thing in the world she had to cope with, her troubles were over.

"Run and get Granny," she whispered to me, pulling the dollar out of her pocket and handing it to the cashier with a staunch vow that the rest of it would be here soon.

I searched the crowd frantically for Granny.

"Yonder she goes," someone said, pointing down the road where Granny was just disappearing around the first bend.

"I'll go get her," Cabe offered, and started out at a run.

Granny was beaming with joy when she came puffing back up the road. She finished the payment and carried the bedstead back and leaned it up against the tree caressingly.

"Bless you, child," she kept mumbling, stroking Lou on the head.

"Don't bless me," Lou said. "Bless him." She pointed to Cabe. Granny didn't know what it was all about, but kept reassuring Lou she'd pay her the dollar soon as she got one.

"Oh, that's all right," Lou said, as if the perfume was the last thing in the world she wanted now.

I looked at Cabe, his hair blue-black in the bright sun and his strong hands helping the auctioneer move a dresser. More than even I wanted the magic perfume!

The rest of the day passed pleasantly. Mom and Grandma brought extra sandwiches for us and we had a glass of lemonade for lunch. In the afternoon, sitting in the shade of the grape arbor, Lou and Maryellen, with much giggling, planned the parties and dates they would have when Lou would come to town to stay all night with Maryellen. When the shadows began to lengthen, families started to load up and go home. Where a rug or rocking chair had been hauled to the sale, a perforated tin cupboard or 10-gallon crock might be making the return trip. We saw Jeptha Alexander put a coop full of squawking pullets in the back of his spring wagon, and someone out from town tied a cow to the back of his buggy. Everything going off in different directions, I thought sadly, and was gladder than ever that at least the bedstead was going back to an even earlier home.

"Who bought the bull?" Lou suddenly demanded, for in the excitement of the day we had forgotten this thing of all things. And then, because Maryellen was there, and because we had never let her know how we felt about their bull, we passed it off as a joke and acted uninterested.

Cabe was going to haul Granny and her bedstead home and he asked Lou and me if we wanted to ride, too.

From the wagon bed we saw the auctioneer still busy selling the remnants of the farm tools. The bull, pawing and snorting, was tied securely in his pen until his new owner came to cart him away. We waved good-by to him in mock sorrow, singing jubilantly, "I'll be glad when you're dead, you rascal you."

Cabe said he wished he could have bought him. "Wouldn't take long to build up a good herd. A man could get ahead with pedigreed stock."

The wagon road didn't go all the way to Granny's cabin. It was too steep and rocky, so we climbed out and carried the bedstead the rest of the way. Cabe stayed to help put it up, and it did look handsome after Granny had made up the bed and put her famous Flower Garden quilt on it.

"You didn't really see any bugs, did you, Cabe?" I asked, trying to unscrew one of the brass knobs.

"Naw, but it worked, didn't it."

"How'd you ever get it off? I can't budge this one."

Cabe took hold and tried to unscrew it. "I guess it was the other one," he said. "This just be rusted on." He kept trying, though, and finally got it loose.

"Nope, not nary a bug," Cabe said, shaking the brass knob. And then something did fall out on the floor. He picked it up and examined it closely. "Well, say, look at this." He began unrolling a piece of paper.

"A hundred-dollar bill!" Lou gasped, and Granny and I reached over and touched it gingerly to see if it was real. We hurriedly unscrewed the others, but there were no more.

"A hundred dollars," Cabe said, softly respectful.

"Oh, Simm, Simm," Granny was crying. "You weren't out of your head at all."

We explained to Cabe what Granny was talking about and stayed until she had quit crying and calmed down. Then we hurried home with the news.

Life was full and satisfying, I thought, as I paused momentarily at the barn yard gate. The soft summer twilight was a gentle thing. Mockingbirds were already starting their evening serenade. Chimney swifts circled overhead. We would have to hurry with the milking tonight. And then I saw him, chained up in the machine shed, pawing and snorting and bellowing profanely. Dad and Grandpa were standing off, looking at him critically.

"How'd he get here?" Lou demanded, outraged, pointing an accusing finger at the familiar old brindled, diabolic friend.

"We bought him," Dad said, proudly. "Looks as if you kids might get to college yet."

We didn't want to seem unappreciative. Dad set a great store by a college education. Lou managed a sickly green sort of grin, and I smoothed out the goose flesh on my arms. We, too, had thought vaguely of a college education, but now it seemed a dismal thing indeed.

"I guess we'll need it, though," Lou said glumly, "if we're going to have to cope with that bull and his offspring the rest of our lives."